This article is written for drone users that use their drones to film wildlife. Many species of wildlife have far better hearing and sight than humans so a stealthier drone is necessary to film them effectively. The main stealth capability of military drones is their ability to circumvent radar. Visibility and noise are not that important because military drones operate too high up to be seen or heard. Wildlife do not have radar. Civilian drones operate at dramatically lower heights than military drones and can be both seen and hear at these lower heights. This article will focus on how to decrease visibility and noise. Civilian drones are generally quadcopters and this article focuses on quadcopters but a most of the advice would apply to any civilian drone.
1) Visibility – Paint Job
Most drones that advertise as stealth drones are quadcopters that have bodies and propellers made of black plastic. Black is a great color if you are going to use your drone at night but then you need to deal with the limited visibility of your target. The wildlife you want to film might also be asleep at night and not worth observing. Research in aircraft camouflage studies done during WW II found that “sea grey” was the best color for daytime camouflage. Paint your drone sea grey! The night camouflage studies found that matte black is marginally less visible at night than glossy black.
2) Visibility – Transparent Body
A paint job is a five dollar and two-hour solution to the problem of visibility but not the best solution since a paint job that works for the day does not work for the night and vice versa. The advantage of a transparent drone is that the drone will be less visible in both the day and the night. At least that’s what Wonder Woman thought when she rode her invisible plane.
The Hiro Action Sports Airframe is super tough and more important for the subject of this article is transparent! The picture below shows a Hiro Action drone with black wires and a black engine.
Great for the night but not so great for the day. For the day time one could use wires that are as close to sea grey as possible. Painting the engine sea grey is a possibility for a stealthy day drone. Also, transparent quadcopter propellers are available online.
3) Noise Suppression
Off the shelf quadcopter engines and propellers are noisy! Stealth capability is severely compromised because of noise. Visibility issues can be dramatically resolved through relatively cheap, straightforward and easy solutions. There are no easy answers to the problem of noise suppression. I am not going to pretend to be an expert on this very technical subject and instead will refer the reader to several excellent articles on the subject listed below.
I would argue that the second most important category of objects in the DC and Marvel comic book universe are objects of transportation. Superheroes fight supervillains and weapons are needed to do this. Unfortunately for superheroes, supervillains are often a cowardly lot that will flee with the loot rather than fight. Some warrior supervillains like Doomsday will stand and fight Superman but many supervillains try to flee Superman. This means the superhero needs a speedy mode of transport to catch the supervillain and the supervillain wants a mode of speedy transportation to escape. Plus when a crime occurs, the superhero needs to show up at the scene of the crime in the first place. Last but not least, most superheroes patrol anything from a sector of a galaxy, Green Lanterns, to a section of city, Daredevil and Hell’s Kitchen, and need a way of getting around.
In other science fiction universe there is a “vehicle” category but comic books are more speculative fiction than science fiction and some of the most iconic and important forms of transport only vaguely fit even the most general definition of vehicle. This post will look at vehicles but also discuss other objects that provide transportation. Does DC or Marvel have the coolest objects of transportation?
DC Transportation
Below is a list of objects of transportation in the DC universe.
Adam Strange’s Jetpack
Alpha Centurion’s Pax Romana
Ambush Bug’s Teleport Suit
Batboat
Batcycle
Batmobile
Batplane
Birds of Prey – Aerie One
Birds of Prey – Aerie Two
Black Manta’s Sea Saucer
Black Manta’s Walker
Blackhawk Planes
Blue Beetle’s Bug
Blue Tracer
Boom Tube
Booster Mobile
Brains Submarine
Braniac’s Skull Ship
Braniac’s Star Ship
Brontadon (Ship)
Catwoman’s Catmobile
Catwoman’s Catplane
Challenger SST
Clockincopter
Cluster Ship
Cometeer
Craddock Carriage
Di’ib
Doomsday Ship
Eye of Zared
Fiddler’s Fiddle Car
Flash’s Cosmic Threadmill
Flying Fish
Flying Sundial
Fokker Dr. I
Gentleman’s Horse
Gibel Ship
Golden Knight Flying Horse
Gorandian Battle Tripod
Gorandian Submarine
Green Arrow’s Arrowcar
Green Arrow’s Arrowplane
Green Lantern Ring
Grumman XF5F
Gyrosub
Haunted Tank
Hawkman’s Wings
Hourman’s Timeship
Huntress Motorcycle
Javelin-7
Jokermobile
Jonah Hex’s Mechanical Horse
JSA’s Steel Eagle
Justice League Cruiser
Justice League Teleporter
Kal-El’s Rocketship
Kanjar Ro’s Spaceship
Lansarian Morphing Disk
Legion Cruiser
Legion Flight Rings
Legion of Superheroes Flying Rings
Legion of Superheroes Time Bubble
Legion of Superheroes Time Cube
Lobo’s Spacehog
LX-811 Star Cruiser
Mark 494 Star Cruiser
Mitsu-Bishi
Mobius Chair
Multipurpose Intercept/Reconnaissance Vehicle
Mustang Three
Nautilus of Earth ABC
Newsboy Legion’s Whiz Wagon
Omega Men Mothership
Orion’s Astro-Harness
Owlship
P-40 Warhawk
Paco’s Convertible
Panzer-Ship
Peacemaker Hog
Pilgrim One
Quantum Jet
Rip Hunter’s Timesphere
Robin’s Redbird
Royal Flush Gang’s Flying Cards
Sam
Samson’s Chronomobile
Sandals of Hermes
Scanner One
Scarlet Skier’s Cosmic Skis
Scorpion-Ship
Sea Witch
Sheba
Space Cab
Space Shuttle Excalibur
Star-Rocket Racer
Starhunter’s Sunrider
Steel Eagle
Super-Cycle
Superman’s Phantom Zone Projector – It transports you to another dimension!
Supermobile
Swinging through the rooftops – Batman
T-Jet
T-Sub
Teen Titan’s Helicopter
Thangarian Star Cruiser
Time Bubble
Trickster’s Air Shoes
User: Bonesaw 19
Vig-Cycle
Vigilante’s Motocycle
Warehouse X Toys
Warhound
Warlord’s Plane
Whirly-Bat
Whiz Wagon
Wildcat’s Motorcycle
Wingcycle
Wonder Woman’s Invisible Plane
Some of the more famous objects of transportation are Adam Strange’s Jetpack, the Batmobile, the Flash’s Cosmic Threadmill, the Haunted Tank, Hawkman’s Wings, Green Lantern’s Ring, Kal-El’s Rocketship, Legion of Superheroes Time Bubble, and Wonder Woman’ Invisible Plane. The top two of this list, the crème de la crème, are the Batmobile and Kal El’s Rocketship. If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery then the Batmobile has been praised again and again. The Arrowmobile, Catmobile, Jokermobile and to some extent the Spider-Mobile, as parody, are all derived from the Batmobile. Kal-El’s Rocketship refers to the space ship that delivered Superman to the planet Earth from Krypton. The Batmobile has been the subject of schematics from the beginning and you can buy toy collections of Batmobiles from the golden age to the present.
Superman’s rocket is a very different affair and the particulars of how the ship looks have varied tremendously from the golden age to the present. This is a contest between a very visually defined vehicle and an icon. The historic significance of Superman’s rocket ship is more important than the Batmobile. The rocket ship is an integral part of the Superman mythos and that mythos in turn largely defined comic books from the beginnings to the present. On iconic grounds I would say Kal El’s rocketship is the most important object of transportation in the DC universe and the coolest.
Marvel Transportation
Below is a list of objects of transportation in the DC universe.
Asgardian Star Jammer
Avengers Quinjet
Big Wheel
Dr. Doom’s Time Machine
Dr. Strange’s Cloak of Levitation
Fantastic Four’s Fantasti-Car
Fantastic Four’s Pogo Plane
Flying Horses – Valyky, Black Knight
Galactus Ship
Ghost Rider’s Hell Cycle
Green Goblin’s Glider
Guardians of the Galaxy – Freedom’s Lady
Hawkeyes Sky-cycle
Iron Man’s Armor
Kang’s Time-Ship
Moon Knight’s Helicopter
Nextwave’s Shockwave Rider
Quasar’s Quantum Bands
Runaway’s Leapfrog
S.H.I.E.L.D. Flying Car
S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier
Silver Surfer’s Board
Spider-Man’s Spider-Mobile
Stiltman’s Stilts
Swinging through the rooftops – Spiderman, Daredevil
Thor’s Hammer Mjolnir
X-Men’s Blackbird
Some of the most important objects of transportation in the Marvel universe include:
the Fantasti-Car, Iron Man’s Armor, the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier, Thor’s hammer and the X-Men’s Blackbird. I have to mention is the Spider-Mobile that is largely forgotten but was in Spider-Man during the seventies and was hilarious. The Spider-Mobile was a parody of consumerism. Spider-Man agreed to ride the Spider-Mobile for an ad agency. Spider-Man is about always broke. The problem was the Spider-Mobile was constantly having troubles. Webhead would have been better of sticking to his webbing and swinging through the roof tops.
My Marvel favorites are the Fantasti-Car and Iron Man’s armor. Both are marvels of comic book engineering. Schematics of both were provided early on and you could almost believe these machines could be created. They represent very different ideas of design. Iron Man’s armor is a sleek, streamlined, minimalist machine that is a high tech, red and yellow, hot rod of the skies. If Iron Man’s armor is a hot rod then the Fantasti-Car is a Volkswagen that is not streamlined but very practical. The Fantasti-Car has a modular design that looks goofy but allows the individual Fantastic Four members to break away from the main ship and fight more effectively as a group. Iron Man led to any number of armored imitators and again if imitation is the sincerest form of flattery then Iron Man’s armor wins. However, does Iron Man’s armor deserve to win in this sort of contest? Iron Man’s armor is more weapon than transport. I think because of this the Fantasti-Car is the winner in the Marvel universe. The modular design of the Fantasti-Car might have real life applications.
The Soviet Union often used tank riders instead of trucks for transportation during WW II. Men hung onto tanks for dear life. This was done due to a lack of trucks on the part of the Soviet Union. However, later many tactical advantages came out of this experience. The men could quickly jump from the tank and provide support to the tank and vice-versa in a way troops in trucks could not.
I wonder if there is the possibility of some sort of helicopter rider system in which special forces could break away from a helicopter using some sort of individual pod rocket system attached to the outside of the helicopter allowing for greater speed in exiting than the current rappelling system used by special forces. You enter the external rocket pod using a door on the inside of the helicopter to provide maximum protection until the moment of exit. The rocket pod also allows quicker dispersal of special forces around an area and the pod also offers some extra protection upon exiting the protection of the helicopter.
Conclusion
The winner of the DC competition is Superman’s rocket ship. The winner of the Marvel competition is the Fantasti-Car. I love the sixties campiness of the Fantasti-Car but iconic value beats campiness and Superman’s object wins as the coolest object of transportation! DC wins! In the course of this study something else stood out.
What is very interesting when comparing the objects of transportation of DC with Marvel is that there is a giant difference in the number of such objects. This difference in numbers took me by surprise and is serendipitous result of this study. DC has 117 objects of transportation. Marvel has 27 objects of transportation. I have done my best to be exhaustive in the compilation of both lists but still may have missed an important object of transportation here and there but the difference in numbers is so great that one must come to the conclusion transportation, as reflected in the numbers above, is more important in the DC universe than the Marvel universe. I have my own after the fact theory about this.
I am old enough to have read comic books from the golden age to the present and let me assure younger readers that comic books have changed tremendously! The Marvel universe is a relatively new universe compared to DC whose superheroes and story line foundations were largely created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby in the sixties. I would argue one basic difference between Marvel and DC, especially in the sixties, was that Marvel focused a lot more on fights than the chase. For example, Superman spent way more time flying around looking for crooks than Thor. Thor quickly found his enemy and most of the issue focused on the fight. Thor fought characters like the Hulk. The Hulk does not flee from Thor that’s for sure. I actually bought the first issue in which Thor and the Hulk fought solo and even then I knew this was something different. For one thing Jack Kirby and Stan Lee created all these fight scene cartoon blurb sounds that had no equivalent in the DC universe. Jack Kirby used a lot more lines showing shock waves than anyone else. The fight looked more real and the key to this was actually using exaggerated action that is less real but interestingly looks more real due to the nature of the medium. I am into martial arts and have at least fifty books in the area with pictures that show each move of a kata and the pictures look pretty boring compared to a well done Jack Kirby punch or kick. I came to the conclusion that Marvel had better fight scenes and certainly longer fight scenes than DC. The difference in the quality and quantity of fight scenes between Marvel and DC has largely lessened over time.
I mentioned Doomsday and Superman in the introduction and their fight as chronicled in the Death of Superman storyline was generally one giant multi-issue series of fight scenes. I hate to admit it but I enjoyed the series! Remind me to grow up one of these days. For the record, Superman didn’t die despite the title of the series and I knew darn well Superman wouldn’t die and was amazed how my friends and family bought the lie hook line and sinker! And also for the record, Captain America and Batman are not going to stay dead!
The greater emphasis on fight scenes made Marvel more “modern” from their beginnings. Movies and TV were becoming more violent in the sixties and it made sense for comic books to go this route as well. Stan Lee and Jack Kirby were more attuned to modern media trends than their counterparts at DC at the time and this is one reason Marvel became such a success at the expense of DC. As a side note, I do not consider comic books overly violent at all compared to other media.
Comic books have become more violent from the sixties to the present but are still much less violent than other media. I am especially amazed at some of the cutesy violent video games on Facebook that have tremendous appeal to my nieces and nephews who are in the six to ten year old age group. I would much rather my nieces and nephews were reading the most violent DC or Marvel comic book out there than playing those horrible video games. I guess I am getting old because despite the best efforts of my nieces and nephews to explain the games, I had no interest.
The games are kind of Hello Kitty meets the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. You have these very cute cartoon characters wielding knifes or whatever and doing terrible things to other cute cartoon characters with blood and guts pouring out. I like my genres purer than that. I like Hello Kitty and I like the Texas Chainsaw Massacre but I really don’t care for Hello Kitty acting like Leatherface, the bad guy in the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. The games are very similar to Ren and Stimpy of The Simpsons fame but again are video games rather than a cartoon within a cartoon. I do think the interactive nature of a violent video game as opposed to a violent cartoon on TV is worrisome. Back to the topic of this post!
Another example of fight versus chase, many fifties Batman issues were reprinted in 80 page Giants in the sixties that I read when I was young and in many ways I grew up with this version of Batman. The fifties Batman is all about the chase! The Batman of the fifties invariably ended up in some sort of scenario with giant objects. Batman chased and fought crooks in an almost surrealistic landscape. Batmite was introduced at this time and used his reality warping powers not to fight Batman but to make the chase more interesting. There is no Marvel counterpart to this sort of chase.
I would argue the greater number of objects of transportation in the DC universe is due to DC having a golden age inheritance in which the chase was more important than the fight. Marvel does not share this inheritance and presumably would have more weapons than DC. Counting weapons is much harder than counting objects of transportation. I spent hours compiling lists of weapons in the DC and Marvel universe for my last post and am still not happy with the result. Weapons are ubiquitous in comic books. Objects of transportation are much smaller in number and easier to count definitively.
